186 
Fishery Bulletin 99(1 ) 
Table 5 
Summed digested weights (in g) of prey in each family in the diet of P. leopardus collected from Nathan, Wardle, Potter, and 
Noreaster Reefs. Total weights of prey in families are included and expressed as percentages of the total diet. Total weight of prey 
at each reef and number of predator individuals with prey are included. Small-size schooling fishes are underlined. 
Reefs open to fishing Reefs closed to fishing 
Total 
North South North South 
Prey families (Nathan) (Potter) (Wardle) (Noreaster) Number % 
Pomacentridae 
Labridae 
Scaridae 
Caesionidae 
Scorpaenidae 
Synodontidae 
Blenniidae 
Acanthuridae 
Nemipteridae 
Serranidae 
Clupeidae 
Plesiopidae 
Fistulariidae 
Apogonidae 
Enaraulidae 
Balistidae 
Gobiidae 
Creedidae 
Platycephalidae 
Siganidae 
Lutjanidae 
Monacanthidae 
Total weight 
No. of P. leopardusvnih prey 
235.1 
85.3 
159.7 
58.6 
230.0 
127.8 
124.6 
116.5 
23.4 
58.3 
0.6 
4.3 
38.7 
29.9 
82.5 
37.4 
10.8 
12.1 
10.4 
2.6 
1.5 
1.0 
5.7 
1.4 
2.2 
0.2 
0.1 
943.5 
517.4 
92 
102 
195.0 
215.1 
140.5 
148.5 
79.7 
1.0 
133.3 
5.6 
12.0 
82.4 
16.5 
9.8 
5.9 
10.3 
13.2 
2.8 
4.8 
2.3 
1.0 
0.68 
0.33 
472.0 
608.8 
100 
86 
730.4 
28.7 
507.3 
19.9 
437.5 
17.2 
258.9 
10.2 
116.5 
4.6 
99.4 
3.9 
87.3 
3.4 
85.1 
3.3 
82.5 
3.2 
58.0 
2.3 
38.7 
1.5 
13.2 
.5 
6.8 
.3 
6.7 
.3 
6.2 
.2 
2.3 
<.l 
2.2 
<.l 
1.0 
<.l 
0.7 
<.l 
0.3 
<.l 
0.2 
<.l 
0.1 
<.l 
2541.7 
380 
10% by one of the other dietary measures (Tables 4-6). 
The body sizes of these prey families were very different, 
e.g. 31 Clupeidae weighed 39 g, whereas eight Scaridae 
weighed 438 g (Tables 4 and 5). The remaining 17 families 
of prey accounted for approximately one quarter of the di- 
et (summed IRI=24.0%, Table 6). Only four families, Poma- 
centridae, Labridae, Clupeidae, and Synodontidae, were 
eaten by P. leopardus at every reef. 
Comparisons between line-caught and speared samples In 
the diet of the smaller sample caught by line, 21 fish were 
identified into eight families that were a subset of the 
22 prey families found in the speared sample (Table 7). 
The dietary composition of line-caught P. leopardus did 
not differ significantly from the speared catch (at P=0.01 
level of significance, Table 8, see “Materials and methods” 
section for explanation). When classified by their charac- 
teristic habitat (Table 9), however, the number of prey 
differed significantly between fishing methods (Fisher’s 
exact test| 3 |=18.7, P=0.0003). The proportion of midwater, 
pelagic prey in the diet was higher in the line catch (67%) 
than in the speared catch (21%), which was dominated by 
prey living in the demersal habitat (66% of the diet). 
Because all prey families found in the line-caught P. 
leopardus also occurred in speared specimens, prey fishes 
obtained by the two types of gear identified from each reef 
were pooled for further analyses to increase the sample 
size. 
Comparisons among reefs and zones The number of fam- 
ilies in the diet of P. leopardus varied among reefs and 
ranged from seven families at Noreaster Reef to 15 at 
Nathan Reef (Table 4). There was no detectable differ- 
ence in the number of families in the diet of P. leopardus 
between fishing zones (jf [2] = 1.380, P>0.20, 1-/3 < 0.33). 
Dietary overlap was high between reefs within fishing 
zones (open reefs: Schoener a =0.68; closed reefs: Schoener 
a=0.68) and between fishing zones (Schoener a=0. 65) when 
reefs were pooled. IRI values were higher in Pomacentri- 
dae and Labridae at the closed reefs than at the open 
reefs, whereas the opposite pattern occurred for Scaridae 
and Synodontidae (Table 6). 
The number of prey per family in the diet of P leopar- 
dus varied significantly among the four reefs (Table 8). 
This variation, however, could not be related to the zon- 
ing of reefs because the diet of P. leopardus did not differ 
